The Smithsonian's National Museum of American History houses, amid its illustrious artifacts, two bottles of wine: a 1973 Stag's Leap Wine Cellars Cabernet Sauvignon and a 1973 Chateau Montelena Chardonnay. These are the wines that won at the now-famous Paris Tasting in 1976, where a panel of top French wine experts compared some of France's most famous wines with a new generation of California wines. Little did they know the wine industry would be completely transformed as a result....

The Road to Burgundy: The Unlikely Story of an American Making Wine and a New Life in France

Ray Walker had a secure career in finance until a wine-tasting vacation ignited a passion that he couldn't stifle. Ray neglected his work, spending hours poring over ancient French winemaking texts, learning the techniques and the language, and daydreaming about vineyards. After Ray experienced his first taste of wine from Burgundy, he could wait no longer. He quit his job and went to France to start a winery - with little money, a limited command of French, and virtually no winemaking experience.

A Natural History of Wine

An excellent bottle of wine can be the spark that inspires a brainstorming session. Such was the case for Ian Tattersall and Rob DeSalle, scientists who frequently collaborate on book and museum exhibition projects. When the conversation turned to wine one evening, it almost inevitably led the two - one a palaeoanthropologist, the other a molecular biologist - to begin exploring the many intersections between science and wine. This audiobook presents their fascinating, freewheeling answers to the question.

The House of Mondavi: The Rise and Fall of an American Wine Dynasty

Set in California's lush Napa Valley and spanning four generations of a talented and visionary family, The House of Mondavi is a tale of genius, sibling rivalry, and betrayal. From 1906, when Italian immigrant Cesare Mondavi passed through Ellis Island, to the Robert Mondavi Corporation's 21st-century battle over a billion-dollar fortune, award-winning journalist Julia Flynn Siler brings to life both the place and the people in this riveting family drama.

Vino Business: The Cloudy World of French Wine

Already provoking debate and garnering significant attention in France and within the wine world, Vino Business is a surprising and eye-opening book about the dark side of French wine by acclaimed investigative journalist Isabelle Saporta.

The Juice: Vinous Veritas

For more than a decade, Jay McInerney’s vinous essays, now featured in The Wall Street Journal, have been praised by restaurateurs (“Filled with small courses and surprising and exotic flavors, educational and delicious at the same time” Mario Batali), by esteemed critics (“Brilliant, witty, comical, and often shamelessly candid and provocative” Robert M. Parker Jr.), and by the media (“His wine judgments are sound, his anecdotes witty, and his literary references impeccable” The New York Times).

Wine Wars: The Curse of the Blue Nun, the Miracle of Two Buck Chuck, and the Revenge of the Terroirists

Writing with wit and verve, Mike Veseth (a.k.a. the Wine Economist) tells the compelling story of the war between the market trends that are redrawing the world wine map and the terroirists who resist them. Wine and the wine business are at a critical crossroad today, transformed by three powerful forces. Veseth begins with the first force, globalization, which is shifting the center of the wine world as global wine markets provide enthusiasts with a rich but overwhelming array of choices.

Shadows in the Vineyard: The True Story of the Plot to Poison the World's Greatest Wine

In January 2010, Aubert de Villaine, the famed proprietor of the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, the tiny, storied vineyard that produces the most expensive, exquisite wines in the world, received an anonymous note threatening the destruction of his priceless vines by poison - a crime that in the world of high-end wine is akin to murder - unless he paid a one million euro ransom. Villaine believed it to be a sick joke, but that proved a fatal miscalculation and the crime shocked this fabled region of France.

Wine: Everything You Need to Know About Wine from Beginner to Expert

Are you fascinated by the many kinds of wines you can choose from? Is the rich variety of wines overwhelming? Do you need help choosing the perfect wines - at the right prices? Wine: Everything You Need to Know About Wine from Beginner to Expert provides a brief history of wine, explains wine geography, and teaches you how to recognize a good wine. You'll learn about aroma and balance, what to look for on wine labels, and how to find the best prices!

A Guide to Wine

Actor and wine expert Julian Curry has devised a unique audiobook guide to wine. The whole subject is introduced and explained  how wine is made, the different grapes, the different blends, vintages, wine-growing areas and types. In an entertaining and informal style, he also teaches how to taste wine, and how to choose and store it.

A Vineyard in My Glass

Gerald Asher, who served as Gourmet's wine editor for 30 years, has drawn together this selection of his essays, published in Gourmet and elsewhere, for the collective insight they give into why a wine should always be an expression of a place and a time. Guiding the reader through 27 diverse wine regions in France, Italy, Spain, Germany, and California, he shows how every wine worth drinking is a reflection of its terroir - in the broadest sense of that untranslatable word.

Thirsty Dragon: China's Lust for Bordeaux and the Threat to the World's Best Wines

Thirsty Dragon lays bare the untold story of how an influx of Chinese money rescued France's most venerable wine region from economic collapse and how the result was a series of misunderstandings and crises that threatened the delicate infrastructure of Bordeaux insular wine trade.

The Widow Clicquot: The Story of a Champagne Empire and the Woman Who Ruled It

In The Widow Clicquot, Tilar J. Mazzeo brings to life for the first time the fascinating woman behind the iconic yellow label: Barbe-Nicole Clicquot Ponsardin. A young witness to the dramatic events of the French Revolution and a new widow during the chaotic years of the Napoleonic Wars, Barbe-Nicole defied convention by assuming---after her husband's death---the reins of the fledgling wine business they had nurtured.

A Man and His Mountain: The Everyman Who Created Kendall-Jackson and Became America's Greatest Wine Entrepreneur

A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist tells the story of the self-made billionaire who built the Kendall-Jackson empire from nothing into the biggest-selling brand of premium wines in the U.S. Jess Stonestreet Jackson was one of a small band of pioneering entrepreneurs who put California's wine country on the map. His life story is a compelling slice of history, daring, innovation, feuds, intrigue, talent, mystique, contrarianism, and luck, offering a unique window on the elegant, adventurous, and cut-throat worlds of Jackson's two passions: wine and horseracing.

Extreme Wine: Searching the World for the Best, the Worst, the Outrageously Cheap, the Insanely Overpriced, and the Undiscovered

In Extreme Wine, wine economist and best-selling author Mike Veseth circles the globe searching for the best, worst, cheapest, most expensive, and most over-priced wines. Mike seeks out the most outrageous wine people and places and probes the biggest wine booms and busts. Along the way he applauds celebrity wines, tries to find wine at the movies, and discovers wines that are so scarce that they are almost invisible.

A Vineyard in Napa

At the age of 47, when he was a successful publishing executive and living with his wife and four children in an affluent Chicago suburb, John Shafer made the surprise announcement that he had purchased a vineyard in the Napa Valley. In 1973, he moved his family to California and, with no knowledge of winemaking, began the journey that would lead him, 30 years later, to own and operate what distinguished wine critic Robert M. Parker, Jr. called "one of the world’s greatest wineries".

Scott says:"Great story of one family's growth with California's Wine culture"

Gallo Be Thy Name: The Inside Story of How One Family Rose to Dominate the U.S. Wine Market

Gallo Be Thy Name is the portrait of an American dynasty that rose from poverty in the early 1900s to become the most successful wine company in the world through toil, cunning, and crime. From selling ³Dago Red² to Al Capone during Prohibition to conquering America¹s wine market, and from the Great Depression to the roiling farm labor movements of the 60s and 70s, the Gallos rode the turbulent currents of history to triumph, with iconic brothers Ernest and Julio steering the ship.

Napa

James Conaway's remarkable bestseller delves into the heart of California's lush and verdant Napa Valley, also known as America's Eden. Long the source of succulent grapes and singular wines, this region is also the setting for the remarkable true saga of the personalities behind the winemaking empires. This is the story of Gallos and Mondavis, of fortunes made and lost, of dynasties and destinies.

Publisher's Summary

In 1940, France fell to the Nazis and almost immediately the German army began a campaign of pillaging one of the assets the French hold most dear: their wine. Like others in the French Resistance, winemakers mobilized to oppose their occupiers, but the tale of their extraordinary efforts has remained largely unknown - until now.

This is the thrilling and harrowing story of the French wine producers who undertook ingenious, daring measures to save their cherished crops and bottles as the Germans closed in on them. Wine and War illuminates a compelling, little-known chapter of history, and stands as a tribute to those extraordinary individuals who waged a battle that, in a very real way, saved the spirit of France.

The book is a collection of interesting, moving stories about people from various wine regions of France during the German occupation. The performance is so theatrical it nearly ruins the book.

The text is a collection of essentially unrelated stories covering 1939-46 France. There are some recurring characters, but mostly the stories are self contained and told at a very personal level. There is some reflection about the war in general and the currents of history, but the focus of the book is on individuals. The stories are funny, passionate, sad and inspirational. The writing is very good and all major regions get a nod.

The performance is terrible. The reader affects an outrageous French or German accent (think Monty Python accents) every time a character speaks--even though they are all speaking in English. He even has some English and American accents later in the book. When you have a German arguing with a Frenchman the rapidly switching accents require tremendous effort to follow and I felt it contributed nothing to the text. Add in some over-acting and his Hitler is almost unbearable.

Most history books mention that France quickly fell and then was liberated several years later but the time in between is rarely examined. The authors do a good job of describing the daily uncertainty and moral ambiguities of living and working in an occupied country. They do not appear to have a bias and manage to portray some of the occupying Germans as complicated characters, not caricatures.

I enjoyed the text but almost couldn't finish the book because of the overly dramatic performance.

This is a vino-centric history of WWII. It is told in an anecdotal style that is quite entertaining if at times somewhat disjointed. The broader scope of the war and the global impact it had on the formation of the modern world are beyond the scope of this lighthearted work. This book relates the triumph of the human spirit over adversity and does it in an engaging feel-good manner. For me it was a nice departure from the usual WWII histories I delve into. Much of the book revolves around the ways the French wine makers managed to preserve some of their best vintages from the hands of their Nazi occupiers. At times it has a Hogan’s Heroes vibe to it with the French underground seeming to run circles around the oblivious German overlords. And isn’t this the real story of war; that no matter how tough are the times, people will always try to triumph? This is the story of people placed in a bad situation and not only make the best of it but look beyond to a better future time when life might return to normal. I think this is the kind of thing historians are really looking for in by returning time and again to the battlefields of WWII. It is curious to find such a profound truth is such a simple book. Perhaps one must first wade through a panoply of thirty-hour “serious” histories of WWII to be able to discover it here.

Todd McLaren gives a fine narration. I always enjoy his slightly sarcastic delivery. His accents of French and German voices are decidedly from a native English speaking American intonation, but that’s OK because that is how I sound when I think them in my own head.

As a lover of French wines, and a ww2 history fan, this book was very interesting. However, for having so many French words in it, you could tell the reader was not very well versed in French. It made made some words and regions unrecognizable to the readers who understand French. It ruined the overall flow and experience.

ww II was a time of challenges and struggles in so many lives. The wine industry in France was one of those stories that was relatively unknown. great book that touches on the emotions and financial reality of that time.